When Ed had received Roy's wedding invitation, she had to use all her diplomacy -which wasn't much to begin with- to stop Al from going to Central and kill the General. She finally managed to calm him enough for him to see reason. But when, not a week later, came the invitation for the General Bachelor Party, that was the icing on the cake. There wasn't much she could do in front of Al's rage when even Granny Pinako needed to be restrained.

She was used to contain Ed's tantrums -hitting him with a wrench worked well enough. Al however, was more of a challenge because if he was angry, he usually had pretty good reasons for it. What's more, an angry Al was one really frightening sight. It was as if the younger Elric kept all his anger in, till the day he had a reason to let it burst. When it did, it was like an unstoppable hurricane. You know what they say about the quiet ones...

So, seeing the silent rage of her husband, Winry had taken the safest course of action and cleared the way. She watched him leave one more time, as she had done so many times before, and stayed behind to keep the boat afloat. She was pretty pissed herself, even if her motives were different. As always, Ed seemed to came first in Al's heart. No matter that they were married now. Alphonse hadn't even taken the time to speak to her, before leaving to revenge his fucking prodigy of a brother.

She had to stay on the sidelines, as always. It was the way things had always gone since how long she could remember. She never would be more than second best in her husband's heart. She knew it would be that way and she accepted that when she accepted to marry him. It was not so bad after all. It was still much more than she would have ever been for the Elric she was really in love with... But it was still painful sometimes to be discarded by Al like she always had been, so carelessly, by Ed.

She feared that would come a day when she would resent Al like she resented Ed, even begin to hate him. She didn't know when the love she had always felt for the older Elric turned into something so ugly that it couldn't be named anything else than hatred. She hid it, of course, like she was used to hide pretty much all the things she was really feeling. She hadn't had much of a choice. People couldn't know that she hated Edward or they would scorn her. Everyone loved him, everyone was always in awe of him, so swept away by his fucking aura, she could puke. No, she sure couldn't show her true feelings or she would loose the scraps of happiness she had saved for herself with so much work.

She couldn't even begrudge people, and Al less than anyone else, for swooning at Edward, when even her had been smitten with him at one point. However, she wasn't anymore blinded by the man's glow that she couldn't see his weaknesses. Edward was a sinner, he always had been. He was the one guilty of trapping his own brother in an unfeeling armor for years. No matter if he had ended giving him his body back, Al should still be angry with him for that. But he wasn't, and that was so unfair.

Ed was also guilty of despicable lust in her eyes. How come anyone could not see how disgusting he was to desire another man? A much older one at that! Even when he knew that the man had murdered Winry's parents and countless other people. In her opinion, Ed totally deserved the anguish he was now feeling. He had brought it upon himself with his unnatural relationship. And he let it go so much out of proportions! He was such a drama queen, always had been. People were dumped everyday and they learned to deal with it without destroying themselves and everyone around them. But no, Ed had to make it in such a big deal, he had to grant himself the empathy of every witnesses. That made her sick. When he had broken her heart by leaving her alone in Rizenbool or by letting that bastard Mustang fuck him, did she flaunt her grief at everyone, sucking them all in her world of hurt? No she hadn't. So why didn't that make her a better person than he was?

Two days after Alphonse's departure, Winry was working outside on the garden Granny had helped her grow. She knew Al expected her to look after his brother, but she refused to babysit Ed. That was why she felt somewhat guilty when the alchemic explosion came from the house. The last time she saw one so powerful was years ago when the brothers tried to bring Trisha back. While hurrying to Ed's room, she hoped that the young man hadn't done anything drastic as, if he had, Alphonse wouldn't ever forgive her.

When she finally reached the door and opened it, complete dread fell upon herself. She spent quite a long time staring at Ed with a strange mix of awe and horror. She finally shook herself and scanned the room for the letter she knew should be here. It didn't take long for her to find it and even less to read it. Then she began to laugh, a broken laugh just this side short of hysterical.

The fucker had the guts to pretend he did it this way so that they wouldn't have a big mess to clean after him. As if the fact he did it itself wasn't already a big enough mess to last them the rest of their life. She could quite clearly picture the following events. Al would be devastated and would try to reverse it the same exact way than all those years ago. Winry would stay alone once again, watching another Elric walk out of her life. That was priceless really.

She didn't know what her reaction should be but it seemed so fitting in a way. Edward Elric had always been such a show-off. Didn't want to make a mess? As if he fooled her! Suicide by self-human transmutation was showing some nerves, she had to give him that. She was able to appreciate the irony he put in this. While she had always thought that, with his looks, he should be called the Golden Alchemist instead, he was now "Fullmetal" indeed.

The worst sin Ed had always been guilty of, was pride, but this time it was ridiculous. What did he expect? That they would exhibit his perfectly rendered statue in a museum or something, even when they knew perfectly well it was really his body? He was still so beautiful, even in the coldness of metal. She hated and resented him so much. Really, she did. Yet, her tears continued to flow and would for a very long time.

Afterwords: It appeared some of my readers were confused by the way Ed comitted suicide and as I am not too keen on changing the way I wrote it, I'll simply explain here. Edward transmuted himself in a statue made of metal. We'll say he used the metal contained in both his blood and automail to respect the equivalent trade. I am aware that it is scientificly-unlikely but hell so is all this Alchemy crap, so there. Anyway, I used this way as a symbol and object of irony more than for any need for realism. Hope that cleared everything.